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Robert Stout was born on 28 September 1844 at Lerwick, Shetland, Scotland, the eldest of the six children of Thomas Stout, a merchant, and his wife, Margaret Smith. His education began at kindergarten at about the age…

Charles and Edward Davis were two of the four sons of John Charles Davis (Hōne Hāre Rēweti) and his wife, Te Riutoto Aihe. John was the son of Merekaimanu of Ngāti Whanaunga and Ngāti Pāoa and Edward Telford Davis, of…

Bernard Fergusson was the country’s tenth governor-general and the last in a long line of British representatives in the imperial tradition. Cheerful and friendly, he was immensely popular and admired for his…

Iris Guiver Wilkinson, better known as Robin Hyde, her chosen name as poet and writer, was born on 19 January 1906 in Cape Town, South Africa. She was the second daughter of Edith Ellinor (Nelly) Butler, an Australian…

Alister Donald Miles McIntosh was born at Picton on 29 November 1906, the eldest of four children of Henry Hobson McIntosh, a telegraphist, and his wife, Caroline Margaret Cowles Miles. From 1920 to 1924 he was educated…

Howard Morrison was one of the most beloved New Zealand entertainers of the second half of the twentieth century. A household name from the 1960s, both as a member of the Howard Morrison Quartet and as a solo performer…

Guy Hardy Scholefield was born at Dunedin on 17 June 1877, the third child of John Hoick Scholefield, an accountant, and his wife, Marion Hardy. His father died in 1885, and the family moved to Milton, South Otago. Guy'…

Tāwhiao, of Ngāti Mahuta in the Tainui confederation of tribes, was the son of Waikato leader Pōtatau Te Wherowhero and Whakaawi, Pōtatau's senior wife. He was born at Ōrongokoekoeā on the upper Mōkau River towards the…

Te Rata Mahuta was the fourth leader of the Māori King movement. He inherited many of the leadership qualities of his predecessors, with the added support of 50 years of widespread Māori recognition of the special…

Early life Hone Peneamine Anatipa Te Pona Tuwhare was born on 21 October 1922 at Kokewai, a rural area south-east of Kaikohe, Northland. He was of Ngāpuhi descent, with connections to Ngāti Korokoro, Ngāti Tautahi, Te…

Joseph George Ward (registered at birth as Joseph Ward) was born in Hawke Street, North Melbourne, Australia, on 26 April 1856, the son of Irish immigrant parents William Ward, a clerk, and his wife, Hannah Dorney.…

Bruce Biggs had a distinguished career as a scholar but he was also that rarer thing, an exceptional builder of academic institutions. In academic Māori studies he was the most influential figure of the twentieth…

Youth Sonja Margaret Loveday Vile was born on 11 November 1923 in Wallaceville, Upper Hutt. Her mother, Gwladys Ilma Vile, was a state-registered nurse; her father was Gerald Dempsey, an army major from Cork, Ireland…

Marti Friedlander was one of New Zealand’s most outstanding twentieth-century photographers. Her work was massively influential both in the development of photography as an artistic practice in New Zealand and in the…

Patrick Hodgens Hickey was born on a backblocks farm at the junction of the Wangapeka and Motueka rivers in Nelson, New Zealand, on 19 January 1882. He was the fourth of seven children of Irish Catholic immigrants…

Mina Louise McKenzie was a key player in New Zealand’s museums sector from the 1970s to the 1990s. As curator, and later director, of Manawatū Museum, she pioneered a model of museum practice which placed primacy on…

Lindsay Poole was a forester and senior public servant who guided the New Zealand Forest Service, first as assistant director then as director, during the middle decades of the twentieth century. His career followed an…

Maurice Shadbolt was a leading figure in the growth of a New Zealand literature during the second half of the twentieth century. He was the first New Zealand author to earn a good living as a full-time writer, although…

Catherine Wilson Malcolm was born in Liverpool, Lancashire, England, probably on 10 March 1847, the daughter of Scots parents Jemima Crawford Souter and her husband, Andrew Wilson Malcolm, a clerk. She was called…

Sir Leonard Thornton was New Zealand’s outstanding military leader in the second half of the twentieth century. He demonstrated leadership, administrative skill, and diplomacy in both war and peace, becoming New Zealand…